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Right now it's all the craze to, amidst one of the hottest-record Summer seasons, dump a bucket of ice water on your head as an alternative to donating towards ALS research. The list of public and private people who have jumped on this goofy bandwagon is too numerous to mention.

Has anybody figured out what a bucket of icewater actually has to do with a degenerative nerve disease? Does Lou Gherig's disease make you suddenly feel wet & cold for about five minutes on a hot Summer day?

Sorry, but count me in the tiny little camp of people scratching our heads wondering what difference this really makes? Has anyone managed to prove that more money = more curing? Jerry Lewis over 50 years, raised tons of money for Muscular Dystrophy research and there's still absolutely no cure. Perhaps using money to as a gauge of "success" in medical research is not the right approach?

But we here at BSA digress... it's not really about making the world a better place. It's about making YOU feel like you're doing something, even if you're not, so you can go to bed thinking you're "making a difference" because you dumped a bucket of icewater on your head. Congratulations!

However, if you are wondering, are there better, more appropriate "Charity Challenge" events you could promote, we at BSAlert have come up with a few. Check them out....

The National Tea Party Convention, an event I'm sure many readers have already gotten tickets for, has run into a couple of snags. Fortunately there's one big-haired semi-pro ex-governor who's going to pull it out of its doldrums.

Israel has taken the next step in pushing its own friendly image in cyberspace: An army brigade dedicated to astroturing pro-Israel messages on Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and other social networking sites.

The Israel Defense Forces Spokesman's Office is to begin drafting computer experts with an eye toward establishing an Internet and new media department unit, Army Spokesman Brig. Gen. Avi Benayahu said Monday.

Speaking at the Eilat Journalists Conference, Benayahu said the new department would focus on the Internet's social media networks mainly to reach an international audience directly rather than through the regular media.

Keep this in mind the next time you criticize Israel's invasion of Palestine online and get called an anti-semite. It could be a member of the IDF (instead of AIPAC).

Corporate marketing departments are essentially chock-a-block with evil geniuses. They put most government propaganda machines to shame and could make a blind man buy contact lenses. Few folks have the audacity to put their company in every spotlight available (and making some up so they can be in those, too) like McDonalds. Check out their latest campaign.

There is a peculiar disease that affects a certain group of people every few years. Those people? Olympic organizers. The disease? Dumb logo mania. Whether it's cavorting panda bears or a truly ridiculous torch/bee/spring combination, the people who are tasked with coming up with an Olympic logo, a logo which is meant to show the entire world that your city is not going to screw up the Olympics, can be some real morons. And the right honorable Brits are no different.

Blogger Colleen Caldwell rants and riffs about whatever strikes her fancy — a run-in with her child's school principal, the rising price of Girl Scout thin mints, or an upcoming movie that caught her eye.

"Has anyone out there read a book called 'The Ultimate Gift'? I just heard that a movie is being made of the book (which sold 4 million copies)," she wrote in a recent post on her site, Simple Kind of Life.

The 30-year-old software analyst from Brooksville, Fla., went on to praise the inspirational message of the Fox Faith film, which opens today, about a trust fund baby who discovers the joy of giving.

One thing Caldwell didn't mention: She was paid $12 to build buzz about the movie's opening and the charitable campaign — bringing her blogging-for-dollars take to more than $7,700.

I can assure you here at BSAlert, we're not taking any money to run stories... after all, when have we said something nice about anybody lately?

A television network's marketing campaign went badly awry on Wednesday, causing a day-long security scare in Boston that closed bridges, shut major roads and put hundreds of police on alert.

UPDATE: The two ad people responsible for planting the displays have been arrested and plead not guilty, and agreed to only answer reporters' questions regarding hair styles of the 1970s. Check out the video of the press conference and learn (about 70s hair styles, and how little a sense of humor mainstream media has).

A U.S. Marine Sargeant was ordered to put a stop to an online auction which would have allowed the winner to pick the name the young Marine would legally assume. Sgt. Cody Baker might have become Sgt. Finest Freshest Fastest or Sgt. Mr. Clean although the winning bidder at the time the auction ended was FreebieStore.com with a bid of 30,000.01. Apparently the Dept. of Defense was not amused (is anyone surprised?).

Who needs a plan when you have a new slogan! Because YOU, the A.D.D. American public can't be bothered to understand the details of anything, you get a new slogan! Aren't you excited?

The Bush administration and the same folks who gave you: Operation Enduring Freedom, Cut and run, Stay The Course, You're-Either-With-Us-Or-With-The-Terrorists, You Forgot Poland, USA Patriot Act, Support Our Troops, Activist Judges, People Who "Hate Our Freedom," Islamo-Facists, Surrender Monkey, Iraq Is The Central Front On The War On Terror, Politics of Hate, Compassionate Conservatism, Weak On National Security and more have a new slogan... it's not a real plan. Instead it's a buzzword about the idea of a plan. It's called A New Way Forward. Feeling warm and fuzzy yet?

The life-size cutout of Jesus was accompanied by a youth group from Lamoni United Methodist Church who came to Jordan Creek Town Center in West Des Moines, Iowa to view the movie "The Nativity Story."

As they took turns pushing the cardboard Jesus on a two-wheeled handcart through the mall's festive decorations and Christmas music, the faces of the shoppers around them registered surprise and curiosity.

Two new efforts to get out the vote here in the U.S. are relying on the two cornerstones of modern-day advertising--sex and greed. An Arizona ballot initiative proposes to award 1 million dollars to one lucky voter in a lottery-style system. So Arizona voters will vote on whether voters will win money by voting. I like those odds. Nationally, an ad campaign sponsored by the non-partisan group Women's Voices features sexy Hollywood actresses talking about the "first time" they... voted. In a sign that they're probably on the right track, syndicated radio blow-hard Rush Limbaugh has called the spots demeaning to women.

The producer of the canned pork product Spam has lost a bid to claim the word as a trademark for unsolicited e-mails. Hormel has been trying to prevent software companies from using the word "spam" in their products, a practice it argued was diluting its brand name. Research has shown that via Google, most searches for "spam" had absolutely nothing to do with the food product.

It's a shame the spammers don't have some sort of union. This case looks like grounds for them to claim that the meat product is usurping their famous brand.

When Terry Wilson filed for trademark protection for her "Tightpod" laptop protectors, she received a cease-and-desist order. The order from Apple reads in part: "The Tightpod mark will inevitably cause consumer confusion as to the source of the products, and dilute Apple's famous iPod mark."

She's not the only one.

Apple Computer has slapped Podcast Ready with a "cease and desist" letter, claiming that the terms "Podcast Ready" and "myPodder" infringe Apple's trademarks, and that they cause confusion among consumers. The company has been cracking down on use of the word "pod" by all sorts of parties, even though its trademark is for the word "iPod."

At a news conference after his spirited address to the United Nations on Wednesday, President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela expressed one regret: not having met that icon of the American left, the linguist and MIT Institute Professor Noam Chomsky, before his death.

Providing Chavez can last after calling George W. Bush the devil, his wish may be granted because Chomsky is very much alive, and quite amused at the Venezuelan President's remarks. But also pleased that Chavez promotion of his book, “Hegemony or Survival: America’s Quest for Global Dominance,” has propelled it to best-seller status. By the way, this is a great book if you haven't read it. Read more of this article for links on free downloads of Chomsky podcasts.

A tiny little movie making fun of Al Gore, supposedly made by an amateur filmmaker, recently appeared on the popular Web site YouTube.com.

At first blush, the spoof seemed like a scrappy little homemade film poking fun at Gore and his anti-global warming crusade.

Unfortunately, ABC News has found out the supposed amateur video is likely part of a professional effort coordinated by the Republican party (and likely oil company benefactors) to discredit Gore and his global warming educational campaign.

In an effort to smokescreen the global warming issue, the spoof says Al Gore claims global warming is responsible for everything from the Middle East crisis to the outcome of American Idol. Whatever humor the PAC firm DCI Group, LLC were trying to deliver is overshadowed by the totally mean-spirited and intellectually dishonest manner in which they completely distort reality.

Today is Chick-Fil-A's second annual "Cow Appreciation Day" (otherwise known as Lets-get-some-idiots-to-promote-our-company-for-virtually-nothing day). What does this mean for you? Well, if you're willing to dress up like a cow from head to toe, you get a free combo to help fill the void in your otherwise empty life. And some goofballs at an advertising company show Chick-Fil-A they can convince people to do just about anything for a 400+ calorie, 16g fat, MSG-doused, 1300mg sodium-laced, breaded and fried in peanut oil chicken sandwich.

Citing overwhelming customer dissatisfaction with its mail-in rebate system, OfficeMax said it will eliminate the program beginning this weekend.

A small victory in the battle against supremely annoying corporate marketing tactics has been won. We here at BSA have always said, Don't buy products with rebates! It's like a tax on people who are stupid enough to waste their time and compromise their privacy by jumping through a bunch of hoops to purchase a product at an advertised price.

But don't get all teary-eyed yet. Methinks the main reason why OfficeMax dropped the scheme was because they got tired of people calling them, pissed off looking for their long, lost rebate checks.

United Airlines has begun showing an in-flight video about military glamor jobs that was produced and funded by the Department of Defense--a fact passengers do not learn from watching it.

Sandwiched between NBC sitcoms and Discovery Channel previews, "Today's Military," as the 13-minute program is called, highlights five jobs that few members of the armed forces could point to as their own.

It shows only one soldier beyond U.S. borders, who's "doing humanitarian work in Thailand" -- a remarkable focus at a time of war. The Defense Department paid United $36,000 to run the video for one month.

Seventeen million customers of the online payment service iBill have had their personal information released onto the internet, where it's been bought and sold in a black market made up of fraud artists and spammers, security experts say.

The stolen data, examined by Wired News, includes names, phone numbers, addresses, e-mail addresses and internet IP addresses. Other fields in the compromised databases appear to be logins and passwords, credit-card types and purchase amounts, but credit-card numbers are not included.

It appears spammers have been buying and selling these lists and using them as sources for solicitations. So if you're getting more spam than usual, it could be because your personal information has been leaked to the black market.

Wal-Mart, in an effort to change public opinion is now mobilizing armies of bloggers to push the pro-company line and counter other sites who are critical of the retail giant. However, some of its blogger army are intentionally reprinting the company's dictates word-for-word and the monster corporation is concerned they may get "ripped" for being the shams they are.

In an attempt to "protect users from spam"--and, coincidentally, earn themselves millions of dollars and create a two-tier e-mail system--Yahoo and AOL are both considering implementing systems in which large companies and frequent commercial e-mailers pay from 1/4 cent to a cent per e-mail. In return for this fee, the mail goes straight to user inboxes, skipping the spam filters that sometimes catch even requested mailings.

Google's recent legal spat with the U.S. Department of Justice highlights not only what information search engines record about us but also the shortcomings in a federal law that's supposed to protect online privacy.

It's only a matter of time before other attorneys realize that a person's entire search history is available for the asking, and the subpoenas begin to fly. This could happen in civil lawsuits or criminal prosecutions.

So, how much do the search engines know? And do they ever delete this information?

Many may have heard the news report last week of the latest recording of Osama Bin Laden offering the United States a truce, but what the news media didn't report much, was he recommended a book by an American author that people should read. As a result Rogue State by William Blum has become a huge bestseller. Move over Oprah!

"It's time for us to rebuild a New Orleans, the one that should be a chocolate New Orleans. And I don't care what people are saying in Uptown or wherever they are. This city will be chocolate at the end of the day. This city will be a majority African-American city. It's the way God wants it to be. You can't have it no other way." New Orleans Mayor - C. Ray Nagin

There are two separate class action lawsuits being brought against various dating web sites, claiming that the companies posted fictitious ads, bogus solicitations, and even had paid employees bait people into renewing their subscriptions to popular online dating sites.

Following up on a story that first surfaced in the gossip pages of the New York Daily News, The LA Times examines the details of a bizarre scheme aimed at scaring U.S. citizens away from importing cheap drugs from Canada.

Marketing executives at Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) agreed to pay a couple of writers to craft a fictional thriller in which a group of terrorists "uses Canadian Web sites to murder millions of unwitting Americans looking for cut-rate pharmaceuticals." Kenin Spivak, one of the novelists, says a PhRMA marketing executive was "intimately involved" in shaping details of the story's plot, characterization and tone. "They said they wanted it somewhat dumbed down for women, with a lot more fluff in it, and more about the wife of the head Croatian terrorist, who is a former Miss Mexico," Spivak said.

The mayor and city council of Newark, New Jersey "hired a fledging newspaper called Newark Weekly News to publish 'positive news' about the city - and will pay $100,000 over the next year for it." The no-bid contract specifies that the paper will "generate stories based on leads" from the mayor's spokesperson and city communications staff. A senior scholar at the Poynter Institute for Media Studies said, "If you are publishing government propaganda in the guise of neutral, detached reporting, that's about as unethical as you can get."

Actor-director Mel Gibson has been asked to recreate the crucifixion of Jesus Christ in the streets of Sydney if the city is selected to host a major Catholic gathering in 2008, a newspaper reported.

Gibson's staging of the Stations of the Cross, a live interpretation of Christ's final hours, would be part of a bid by the city to secure the Catholic Church's World Youth Day in 2008, the Sydney Morning Herald reported Saturday.

So you're home for your dad's funeral. Your mother is a zombie, your brothers and sisters are freaked out, and you're not feeling so swell yourself. The phone rings. Your mom goes to answer it; you figure it's yet another condolence call from a concerned friend, or maybe a neighbor offering a casserole.

But without saying a word beyond "hello," your mom bursts into tears and slams down the phone.

Surprise! You've just been contacted by a telemarketer asking for the deceased by name, hoping to sell him affordable, high-quality aluminum siding.

Well, never fear, my friend. The Direct Marketing Association is looking out for you.

Take a look at almost any ad for cars or cell phones these days, and you'll see one or more awards from J.D. Power and Associates suggesting a track record of quality and reliability.

Unfortunately all this really suggests is that some company paid J.D. Power and Associates money so they could get an ambiguous marketing reference from a company that has more conflicts of interest than Rush Limbaugh opening a chain of Pharmacies.

SomethingAwful got a segment on G4-TechTV and the order came down from high up, "If we see an increase in traffic as a result of your TV appearance, you've failed." Watch as the hilarity unfolds as a popular counterculture web site, desperately tries to de-emphasize its significance on a burned out cable channel.

In a national address, the President took advantage of the holiday and directed people towards a new web site, AmericaSupportsYou.mil - touted as a way to show support for the troops. Apparently one of those ways is to purchase yet another crappy ribbon lapel pin from a Pennsylvania marketing association (whose claim to fame is making a toaster that burns the Target logo on bread, and a stilletto heel that doubles as a beverage holder). Are any of these products actually made in America? Does any of the revenue generated go towards supporting our troops? Are you kidding me?

"For the bargain-basement price of $29,000, your company could be touted by the Hall of Fame quarterback in slots on CNBC and MSNBC," writes PR Week's Julia Hood, about Terry Bradshaw's "Winners Circle" and "Pick of the Week" TV segments. The segments praise companies for their "forward thinking and consistent principles," in what may seem like "a neutral third-party endorsement," but is actually "a paid placement that inconsistently identifies itself as such." The segments are produced by Broadcast News Corporation (BNC), which also pays to air them on MSNBC, CNBC and CNN Headline News. "We're doing this so we can tell a good story about companies," said one BNC producer. PR Week found that MSNBC either ran "a subtle disclaimer" or none at all marking the segments as paid commercial programming.

Don't you love local TV news stories about critical topics like Supernanny, The Apprentice or Survivor? This stuff is almost as exciting and informative as weathertainment.

Denver's local TV news shows have perfected the art of finding "news" stories linked to the prime-time entertainment shows their stations broadcast. A local reporter points out that these newsvertisements are everywhere, and shows plenty of disgusting examples.

A McDonald's television ad that showed a Chinese man begging for fast food has been taken off the air in China following complaints. In a statement faxed to local media on Wednesday, McDonald's defended the ad as an attempt at humor. Reports said viewers complained that the ad's depiction of a middle-aged man on his knees begging for a discount was disturbing because Chinese consider such an act a humiliating indignity.

No word yet, if being seen eating a filet-o-fish sandwich is considered even more of an indignity.

Did your beer supposedly only lasts four months? Yet mayonnaise can last indefinitely if it isn't opened? Here's a guide to the "shelf life" of common food and household items that normally don't have expiration dates.

McDonald's latest ad campaign, launching this week shows a new svelt, fitness-guru version of their Ronald McDonald mascot promoting exercise and fruit juggling. Conspicuously absent from the new commercials are images of their food products.

The online free encyclopedia Wikipedia defines "dog-and-pony show" as a public "display that is somewhat pathetically contrived." That's what the new U.S. Secretary of Agriculture, Mike Johanns, is convening this Thursday, June 9, in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Secretary Johanns will lead a roundtable discussion dominated by the most powerful agricultural lobby organizations in the United States to spread the good news that mad cow disease is no longer a problem in North America. The invited participants include the American Farm Bureau, the American Meat Institute, the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, the National Meat Association, the National Milk Producers and the National Renderers Association. Not a single consumer, human health or public interest group was invited to speak, nor were any scientists who research mad cow and related diseases, such as Nobel laureate Dr. Stanley Prusiner. The USDA hopes to convince the assembled news media that it's time to open the U.S. border to Canadian cattle and time for Japan and Korea to accept U.S. beef and cattle.

There's just one problem with this rosy picture of mad cow disease in North America: it has little or no basis in fact.

Not more than a few weeks after Newsweek's disasterous story and related retraction over Americans flushing the Koran down the toilet and sparking religious riots in which many died, the "news magazine" runs an interesting picture in their Japanese edition.

The cover story shows an American flag, dirtied and tossed in a trash can, its staff snapped in two. The large white text reads, "Amerika ga shinda hi", which translates to "The day America died."

Right about now, every talk radio host is salivating. The big question is how they're going to tie this into a liberal conspiracy to promote hatred of America? To me it just seems to confirm that Newsweek is a crappy publication that has no taste or journalistic integrity, and their zeal of creating overhyped sensationalism transcends national boundaries.

The opening of Star Wars, Revenge of The Sith is breaking all sorts of box office records, and took in more than $16 Million on its first showing alone! This apparently hasn't stopped the film industry from whining that Internet piracy, and online trading of the movie is running them out of busines. One guy was cited for taking a picture of the movie screen.

I mean, it makes perfect sense. Who would want to pay $7.50 and see the movie on a hundred foot screen in 6+ channel sound when you can spend 200 hours downloading a low-quality video version with someone's thumb hanging off the left corner of the frame to watch on your laptop? Those Hollywood people are so intuitive and clever, I bet they're even working a prequel to Pearl Harbor.

If you've been surfing around the net, you've probably seen those annoying "click here to win a free iPod" banner ads. It's basically a Ponzi-esque marketing scheme that people fall for. An enterprising site called iMockery.com has put together a very funny collection of new ads for these schemes.

What happens when you get a telemarketing call from a company called United American Technologies and they're telling you that you need to switch to them because you're with a heathen carrier such as AT&T or MCI that promote gay marriage and kiddie porn? You turn on your trusty tape recorder and expose them before their creator.

This is a little story about a guy named Thesith Williams, who was looking for a fresh start. He figured a clever way would be to "seek revenge" by naming his web site after the title of the latest film in the uber-over-hyped Star Wars franchise. Actually this is a story about a guy who snatches the domain, revengeofthesith.com and concocts a clever story of a pseudo-ficticious novel that the web site promotes, whereupon he can capitalize on the notoriety of the aforementioned George Lucas separate-a-geek-from-his-money-fest.

Pursuant to Section 230 of Title 47 of the United States Code (47 USC § 230), BSAlert is a user-contributed editorial web site and does not endorse any specific content, but merely acts as a "sounding board" for the online community. Any and all quoted material is referenced pursuant to "Fair Use" (17 U.S.C. § 107). Like any information resource, use your own judgement and seek out the facts and research and make informed choices.